Hey Kid, Catch!

"Hey Kid, Catch!" is a television advertisement for Coca-Cola starring Pittsburgh Steelers defensive tackle "Mean" Joe Greene, which debuted on October 1, 1979, and was aired again several times, most notably during Super Bowl XIV in 1980. The 60-second commercial won a Clio Award for being one of the best television commercials of 1979.^[1]

Officially titled "Mean Joe Greene" by McCann Erickson, the advertising agency that created the commercial (which was part of the "Have a Coke and a Smile" ad campaign), the set-up and payoff is classic simple advertising: Following a football game, a child (Tommy Okon) offers an injured Greene a Coke, prompting "Mean" Joe to grab the bottle and guzzle the entire contents, before turning to limp away. He then turns back toward the now-crestfallen child, smiles and tosses the kid his team jersey with the now-famous line, "Hey kid, catch!".^[2] The commercial was listed as one of the top ten commercials of all time by multiple sources, including TV Guide magazine. The ad was also shown in many other countries (including the UK), where Greene was not even well known.

The campaign's art director was Roger Mosconi, the writer was Penny Hawkey, and the singers of the "Coke and a Smile" jingle were Jim Campbell, Don Thomas, Liz Corrigan, Shellie Littman, Arlene Martell, and Linda November. The footage was shot in May 1979 at a small stadium in Mount Vernon, New York, and the commercial was released on October 1, 1979, on ABC's Monday Night Football, though its airing during the 1980 Super Bowl brought it the most attention due to the program's enormous audience.^[3][4]

Greene later recalled that in filming the commercial, it took several takes to get his final line in the commercial right ("Hey kid, catch!"); "It's very hard to gulp down an entire bottle of Coca-Cola, and then speak clearly. The first three takes we did, when I finished the bottle, I looked at the kid and said, 'Hey kid...Urrrp!" It wasn't intentional. I just couldn't say the line without burping."

In popular culture

• In 1999, a Checkers and Rally's commercial parodied this commercial, with the Coke bottle replaced by a Champ burger.^[5]
• During Super Bowl XLIII in 2009, Coca-Cola aired a parody of the commercial to promote its Coca-Cola Zero brand which featured former Steelers player Troy Polamalu in Greene's role. After Polamalu is given a Coke Zero by a child, the Coke Zero is taken away by Coca-Cola brand managers who claim Coke Zero stole their commercial, resulting in Polamalu tackling one of the brand managers and giving the child his shirt.^[6][7]
• An advertisement for the Fox television drama series House, first aired during the 2011 Super Bowl XLV, parodies the original commercial with a similar scene in which Dr. Gregory House, played by Hugh Laurie, throws his cane to a young fan played by Preston Bailey.^[8]
• Greene and Tommy Okon reunited at Apogee Stadium (formerly known as "Mean Green Stadium") for a 2016 special retrospective on Super Bowl's Greatest Commercials, which aired on February 2 (five days prior to Super Bowl 50).^[9]

References